Amazon.com video review:
The least successful film in this series was directed by
stylemaster (and content-underachiever) David Fincher. Ripley, the only
survivor of her past mission, awakens on a prison planet in the far
corners of the solar system. As she tries to recover, she realizes that
not only has an alien gotten loose on the planet, the alien has
implanted one of its own within her. As she battles the prison
authorities (and is aided by the prisoners) in trying to kill the alien,
she must also cope with a distinctly shortened lifespan that awaits her.
But the striking imagery makes for muddled action and the script
confuses it further. The ending looks startling but it takes a
long time--and a not particularly satisfying journey--to get there.
--Marshall Fine
Amazon.com Essentials:
An interesting feature of Alien, Aliens,
Alien 3, and Alien Resurrection, worth watching together if only for the
chance to see how different directors handle essentially the same idea. The results are
decidedly mixed. Ridley Scott's Alien is the most traditional of the
bunch, essentially a haunted-house picture set on a space freighter,
where a monster is picking off crew members one by one. James Cameron's
Aliens is the all-out adrenaline bath, a pulse-pounding action
thriller from start to finish. It plays a little like a Western in
outer space, where the settlers are waiting for a cavalry that never
comes--and the Indians are acid-veined aliens. And David Fincher's
Alien 3 is the rock-video version, in which substance and
storytelling are sacrificed to editing and imagery, as the aliens
attempt to take over a space penal colony.
--Marshall Fine
